Blu-ray Review: FOREVER MARILYN - 7 Discs De-Mythologize Cinema Icon

It's impossible, of course, for anyone born after her death
to see Marilyn Monroe as anything less than an icon of a certain age of cinema.
Her pursed, glossy lips, glorious curves, alabaster skin and platinum hair make
for a particular bombshell look, one that's almost too fanciful, almost
clown-like to take seriously. Out of context of her actual performances, she's a
mix of tabloid drama and pin-up dream girl, someone whose porcelain visage was
as fragile as her emotional state. The breathy voice, whispering seductively or
singing for the likes of sitting presidents, have formed a kind of religious
canon around the actress.

My introduction to the other side, the Norma Jean side of
Monroe, was courtesy of some clever lyrics by Bernie Taupin. Before being re-purposed by a live version from Australia, or the bastardized lyrics to
commemorate the death of a princess, the notion of Marilyn being "more than a
sex symbol" was brought to light with a simple song off of Goodbye Yellow
Brick Road. Elton sings about "Hollywood creat[ing] a superstar, and pain
was the price [she] paid", and that even after her untimely death "the press
still hounded [her]. All the papers had to say was that Marilyn was found in
the nude."

Until receiving this set, I'd never seen a single Monroe
film.

Sure, I'd been subject to hundreds of photos, clips of this or that performance, drag shows,
Madonna's appropriation of the image, TV's Smash, even the first issue
of Playboy, and I'd never seen the woman act, in context, with an ensemble of
actors.

I'd never, in short, seen what really made Monroe such a star.

For beyond the image, the fragility, the visits to hospitals
and string of disappointments, beyond the decades of hype and expectation, I
found myself at times quite smitten with her onscreen charisma. Underneath the
hyperbole and hysteria, there was clearly a person that the camera absolutely
adored.

Curvy beyond modern reckoning (her "size 12" referenced in Misfits
would be positively obese by today's bulimic standards of plastic starlets), she
played vapid with intelligence and vulnerable with a strength of character.

With each of the films in this collection, we see different
sides of the actress, used by some of the most esteemed directors in the history
of the medium, paired with some of the finest actors that cinema has ever seen.
Marilyn's performances in this collection are not always the highlight of each
particular work, but in their own way they tie these disparate films together in
a way that they normally wouldn't be associated.

On and off-set dramas contribute to her myth, yet for the
most part her on-screen persona is presented free of any of the turmoil that
was transpiring off camera. Sure, she was subject to the whims of her parade of
managers and coaches, her preternatural lateness the cause for much tension,
her unreasonable demands masking a deep, bitter and brutal depression. Yet it
is in these roles that her immortality stands, roles drawn out by sometimes
patient, sometimes masochistic directors willing to sacrifice time and expense
to get a little bit of her gold on screen.

It's impossible to forget about the destruction going on off
screen for the entirety of these films, but for the most part one can blithely
ignore the well-tread stories and concentrate instead on that magnetic smile,
her quick wit, her impeccable physicality and (frankly) magnificent physique,
and simply sit back and enjoy the films. For the movies, like Marilyn herself,
are among Hollywood's finest productions.

Beyond the hype, beyond the allusions and references and
remakes and remarks, there was a star named Marilyn who managed to make a
number of the most fun, most entertaining films of her generation. It's nice,
at long last, to see the woman for what she was on screen, not a mere plaything
of male desire, but a genuine actress with range and ability, more than mere
sexpot or subversion of the staid code of 50s cinema.

The Discs

With the release of the aptly titled Forever Marilyn, Fox has collected seven of her more
celebrated roles (including a couple from the MGM library). From Cinerama classics to down-and-dirty character pieces,
from fluffy musicals to timeless comedies, this collection does a remarkable
job at conveying some of what made Marilyn so beloved at the time, and why her
stardom continues to radiate decades later.

I watched the films in chronological order, and save for the
extremely celebrated Billy Wilder vehicle, Some Like it Hot, I was
pretty much unaware of either the fellow cast or production staff on any of
these films. Going through the set was like attending a strange kind of film
festival, each film disparate in its own way, with its only common thread a
single actress. On their own, most of these films are well deserving of their
own appreciation, and often Marilyn herself isn't the driving force of either
the story or the charms of the film itself.

It may be a side effect of her stardom that we've seen these
films presented in such fine gigh definition fashion, but it's a welcome one.
Without Marilyn many of these films would have been forgotten, or at least
sidelined with dozens of other works of equal value. With her inclusion, they're
part of a unique canon of works tied to this megastar, and as such we're lucky
enough to enjoy them tied to her celebrity, yet free from (most) expectations about
genre, story line, etc.

Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953)

This can easily be summed up as the "Diamonds Are a Girl's
Best Friend" movie, as Monroe teams up with Jane Russell to score a man aboard
a cruise ship. The fact that it's directed by Howard Hawks, one of Hollywood's
finest and most prolific, was just one of many pleasant surprises I found
exploring this set.

Russell, like Marilyn, was pretty much simply an icon for
me, a pin-up doll from the War period that set the hearts of many a serviceman
ablaze. Marilyn's terrific in this trifle of a film, but it's Russell that
really sizzles, completely outfoxing her co-star in the sexiness department. We're
told to prefer blondes, but in this case the sassy and sardonic Russell
completely steals the show from the overly affected wispiness of the young
Monroe.

There are song aplenty, and the celebrated key number (mimed
by Madonna and Moulin Rouge alike) remains an absolute hoot,
particularly in the context of the (loose) narrative.

Shot in sumptuous Technicolour, this is a glossy-lipped
cavalcade of early 50s colour cinema, with Monroe's pink dress set against a
blood red background just one of the more outrageous choices the production
staff makes with this film.

How To Marry a Millionaire (1953)

This was the first of several of films on this set that I'd
never even heard of. Directed by the equally obscure-to-me Jean Negulesco, this
was a film that I'd be unlikely to seek out under any other circumstance,
making its inclusion in the set all the more pleasing. Monroe teams up with
Betty Grable and the exceptional Lauren Bacall. Continuing the gold-digging
narrative from the previous film, here we have made explicit the desire for a
group of three young women to hoodwink their way into richness.

The opening of the film is a five minute overture where we
see Alfred Newman (composer of the stirring Fox theme that always beckons to me
of the opening moments of Star Wars) and his symphony swinging through
the theme from "Street Scene". Ostensibly a show-off of the stereophonic sound tied
to the (then) new Cinemascope process, I quite adored this little bit of
gratuitous vintage ostentation.

The story is of course pretty silly, but there's a dry wit
to the whole affair that's quite captivating. Sly nods to real life affairs
with older men (Bacall's reference to that old guy who's in African Queen, for
one) makes the playful dialogue all the more pleasing.

Monroe here is at her most slapstick, yet she looks
positively adorable in her horn-rimmed glasses. The scene in an airplane, where
she has confused Atlantic and Kansas cities, is one of her finest, her comic timing
impeccable and her charm downright intoxicating.

River of No Return (1954)

Another film well off my radar, I was again pretty shocked
to see the likes of Otto Preminger's name showing up as the mind behind one of
the works of this set.

Alas, the film is a bit of a mess, despite some extremely
fine caliber talent. Robert Mitchum remains a power presence as a pioneer
settler who gets taken advantage of by Monroe's beau played by Rory Calhoun
(his second appearance in this set, showing up as Grable's catch in the
previous film). If I knew little of Marilyn, it's safe I knew less of Calhoun,
save for a delightfully insane reference from a Simpsons episode, as well as
his turn in 1984's Angel, a film I proudly own on Laserdisc.

Regardless, the issue of the film is one of plot, with a
fairly preposterous story made all the more dated by the causal sexual assaults
and preposterous portrayals of the aboriginals. Still, there are moments of
great beauty in both the scenery and performance, and Monroe's early musical
performance in a room full of prospectors is a seductive delight.

What's key as well is that we see Monroe free from the usual
trappings of elegance and overly-made up glamour that the previous films tread
upon. Made all the more, well, "real", she remains an incredibly beautiful
presence on screen, almost more so scrubbed from the heightened gloss that
removes any sense of naturalism from her face. Her range in this work is still
a little stilted, but in shows a charismatic side of her free from ball gowns
and big production numbers.

There's No Business Like Show Business (1954)

Monroe's inclusion in this film is as a kind of stunt
casting - she plays a critical role, to be sure, but it's not as if the
entirety of the plot surrounds her plight. Directed by Walter Lang, who would go
on to great success with his next film, The King and I, TNBLS is really
is a film showcasing Ethel Merman and Donald O'Connor. Just a few years after Singin'
In the Rain, O'Connor tries (unsuccessfully, alas) to parlay that charm of
that other "jukebox" film into another hit. Merman belts out in her squaky but
tuneful way hits from a number of her celebrated roles, including the title
song that she made famous on stage in Annie Get Your Gun.

Cruising through a number of Irving Berlin numbers, Marilyn
shows up as a beautiful distraction to young Mr. O'Connor, and she gets her
chance to shine with a particularly libidinous take on "Heatwave".

This was the beginning of the end for Marilyn, and while
some of that darkness shows through in some of the lighter moments, she's still
more than capable of being the pretty blonde who sweeps a young hoofer off his
feet. Fluffy, forgettable fun, it's a fine testament to the talents of Merman
and O'Connor, and a lesser film for Monroe.

The Seven Year Itch (1955)

This is the first of two films on this set directed by Billy
Wilder, and despite its fine reputation I found it to be a bit of a dud. This despite a nifty title sequence by Saul Bass, and some of the more memorable scenes of Monroe's career.

Tom Ewell plays a neurotic New Yorker who sends his wife and
child away for the summer, only to be struck (almost literally) by his upstairs
neighbour played, of course, by Ms. Monroe.

Eschewing voice over for monologue, the scenes of Ewell
talking to himself aloud are distracting and clunky, and the story itself is
more broad and preposterous than it needs be. There are some delightful side
characters, to be sure, and Marilyn herself is quite radiant during this
period, shot with a great sensitivity by the director.

Of course, this will always be known as the film with "that"
scene, a blustery shot of Marilyn standing atop a subway grate. After having
seen the image a million times, was amused to see that the exact images doesn't
appear in the film. Instead, we get a couple medium shots - her legs, her
fluttering hair, but never the shot of her, mouth agape, lost in the pleasure
of the breeze running up her legs.

This is of course as close to socially acceptable raw
sexuality came in the 50's, and the image remains a potent one. That famous white
dress and her gravity embracing cleavage are indelibly part of cinematic
history, and while the film as a whole doesn't quite gel, it clearly has its
moments for it iconographic star to be particularly luminous.

Some Like It Hot (1959)

It's been said that Billy Wilder wanted to shoot Itch
in black and white, but Monroe's contract stipulated that all her films were to
be in colour. I had actually forgotten from the brief clips of Some Like It
Hot that I'd seen that Wilder won out with this film, for reasons apparently
associated with how the two male stars looked in drag on colour stock.

This was the film I was most looking forward to finally
seeing, and it did not disappoint in the least. This is an astonishingly great
movie, breezy and boisterous, as charming and fresh as the day it was made.
Where Itch seemed tired and dated, this film brims with exuberance.

Monroe, it must be said, looks unabashedly, ridiculously amazing
in this work. Slightly heavier than normal (she was apparently either pregnant
or had recently miscarried), her extra curvature makes her pallor seem
healthier, the black-and-white palate doing wonders for providing a sense of
both seduction and sensuality. With this film alone I get the fascination, the
genuine lust that an entire film going generation had for this star. From "that
dress" during the musical number (one of the finest special effects/acts of
misdirection in the history of cinema, I dare say), to the lustful grinding
against Tony Curtis, this is hot stuff indeed.

Yet, despite the obvious, jaw-dropping looks of Monroe, it
never seems to delve into tawdriness.

To say that Lemmon and Curtis are wonderful in this film is
to add to an already pretty full chorus that has praised this film for years.
Listed tops of the AFI list of Comedies, and in the top 25 of any American film
of all time, the plaudits certainly seem well deserved. If there's one film in
this set I'm sure to re-watch over and over it's this, an impressive collision of
theme and genre, wonderful character actors, with a bristling script that's
unafraid to leave 20 minutes before the introduction of one of our leads, or to
leave an hour gap between critical plot moments, only to have them effortlessly
reintegrated into the tale.

Some Like It Hot may be the definitive Monroe film,
the one you should see to see what all the fuss is about. You want to both hug
her and ravish her, her fine line between innocence and hardscrabble, world
wearied alcoholic is crafted gently. Sure, she took a bazillion takes to get
things right in some instances, but my gosh, shouldn't we be pleased that the
result is there on screen to enjoy for eternity.

The Misfits (1961)

Another black-and-white film fills out the set. Misfits
once again brings giants of the screen to the table - this is not only the last
film that Monroe ever shot, but it also stars Clark Gable (in his own final role,
as he died days after filming), Eli Wallach and Montgomery Clift, is written by
Monroe's former husband Arthur Miller, and was directed by John Huston.

The film is a mishmash of parables and metaphors, finding a
group of three men each in their own way in love with Monroe's divorcée
character, culminating in them rounding up wild horses in the Navada desert.

This was clearly near the end for Monroe, yet it's among her
finest performances. If River had her lean towards the natural look,
this shows off Marilyn's scrubbed-free beauty like no other film in this set.
She's effortlessly gorgeous in this film, yet conveying such sadness and
madness that it's hardest here to separate the role from her very public
descent towards full depression.

If the roles appear a bit heavy handed, and the setting more
than a bit claustrophobic despite the grandeur of the wide desert, it's
nonetheless entirely believable that an emotional and unstable Monroe would be able
to twist to her liking the behaviour of certain hard men.

It's unclear what the final message of the film is meant to
convey other than what's superficially a quite trite conclusion, but suffice it
to say, the film plays out with a great deal of conviction and style. Stark
images of bound and sweating horses against the desert sands, or an extremely wide
shot of a raving Monroe screaming about injustice are but some of the more
memorable images Huston and co. managed to capture.

This isn't a film to love like some of the lighter fare, but
it's a powerful work, with Monroe absolutely equal to her compatriots in the
telling of this raw, often tumultuous tale.

Video/Audio

Each film in the set has different levels of both audio and
video presentations, but even the lesser known films have fairly fine high
definition presentations that make for a great addition to any collection.

Gentlemen Prefer Blondes looks positively gloss-tastic,
probably due to a bit of scrubbing of the negative through automatic
processing. Still, it's hardly a heavy handed process, and save for a few
moments where it looks like the picture veers towards the video-y, it's clear
that this film isn't going to look too much better in the home environment any
time soon.

The soundtrack has been expanded to 5.1 (as has most of the
rest of the discs), and in this instance the lushness of the score does well to
be opened up in this fashion.

How To Marry a Millionaire looks half its age in this
sublime Cinemascope presentation. In fact, the only real issues you'll notice
are colour distortion when certain cross dissolves are performed, a facet that's
shared by all the colour films in this set and indicative of the way that such
optical transitions were accomplished during this period via multiple
generation printing.

Cinemascope was originally a 4 channel audio presentation, and whether they
used this original mix or simply expanded the stereo into 5.1, it sounds pretty
darned good.

Audio wise, the same can't be said for River of No Return.
Almost certainly due to the original source recordings, there's an echo-y sound
to much of the dialogue which is quite distracting. I found myself switching
between the stereo (with Dolby processing engaged) and the 5.1 lossless mix to
try to find the best and least distracting mix possible. I soon just reverted
to the on-disc surround track, and stuck with it.

Visually, the film looks as tremendous as the previous
Cinemascope film, not quite up to the standards of a frame-by-frame
restoration, but still very, very good. Real projection elements of Monroe on
the river are clearly delineated from the actual outdoor shots, so sometimes
that clarity comes at a cost of believability for vintage films like this.

There's No Business Like Show Business is a studio
spectacular, and that kind of indoor look is a kind of let down after the
previous two widescreen epics. Still, the film looks and sounds pretty great
for its vintage.

The Seven Year Itch looks particularly great, save
for a few very minor specks. The clarity is such that you can see the mild
soft-focus that Wilder employed on Monroe, and can also tell immediately that
the famous subway grate scene is shot on a studio. Sound wise, it's mostly
dialogue and some fine score/diegetic music, and it all works as well as one
would hope.

The Misfits looks pretty exceptional, especially
given that it's a relatively "lesser" film in the set. Its soundtrack drops the
fake surround and goes for what's essentially a mono mix.

Supplements

Save for one of the discs, the so-called "extras" are pretty
lacking on many of these titles. Most titles contain trailers for the other
films on the set, or the odd Movietone short clip. It appears there was a PBS
documentary on the making of Misfits that would have been a fine
inclusion on that disc.

The two Wilder films get their share of proper attention.

On Seven Year Itch there's a Hays Code:
Picture-in-Picture with Sexual Innuendo Meter which has to be one of the more stupid
additions ever made to a film. The timeline on Monroe is also pretty silly,
stretching at attempts of providing "interactivity" on disc.

The commentary by Kevin Lally works a lot better. As a
biographer of Wilder, Lally puts into context the film and its challenges with
a puritanical, censorious mid-50s cinema environment.

There a short, decent doc called Monroe and Wilder: An
Intersection of Genius which brings together some usual suspects to talk
about the film. I do kind of adore the fact that Hugh Hefner is one of the
go-to guys to talk about all things Marilyn.

There's a 20 minute or so Legacy doc with Producer Tom
Rothman, and a couple Deleted Scenes provided in Standard definition. We get
some stills, some more Movietone clips, and a fluffy "Hollywood Backstories"
piece that does little to add to what was already said elsewhere.

Some Like It Hot has a similar range of added bits. First
there's a chatty commentary with Paul Diamond, kid of original screenwriter I.A.L.
Diamond. He's joined by Lowell Ganz and Babaloo Mandel, the team behind Parenthood,
City Slickers, and a slew of other flicks, who are only here because
they like the film so damn much. There's a few funny bits (including where
Diamond admits to a story about as a kid on set calling Marilyn "fat"), but it's
a pretty uninformative track. Additional comments culled from interviews with
Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon are also interspersed.

There's a couple short docs (Making Of, Legacy),
each about 20 minutes that go into some superficial detail about the
production. Of note are inclusions of interviews with both Diamond and Wilder,
talking frankly about Marilyn, the shoot, and the challenges of making the picture
work.

Leonard Maltin sits down with Curtis for a Nostalgic Look
Back - it's a ribald little chat, and we get some great moments with the
man born Bernie Schwartz as he spills the beans about his time on set.

The Memories from the Sweet Sues sees four of the "girls"
from the band reminisce - it's a nice little addition, but hardly epic.

Finally, there's a trailer, as well as a particularly
annoying "Hall of Memories" that's a poor excuse for a photo gallery.

In conclusion

In spending the last couple weeks living with these films, I've
come to appreciate the talent that lay at the core of the mythology of Marilyn.
While there's only one truly ground breaking, timeless film in the set, this
collection from Fox is an exceptional foray into a part of film history that I
frankly haven't spent nearly as much time appreciating. Without being
associated with Marilyn, I'd have missed the fun of Bacall in Millionaire,
or the somber sonority of Mitchum in River. I had a chance to have a
mini film festival with these works, and it's been a pleasurable little curated
take on this period of cinema history.

At a relatively reasonable price, the set is pretty much a
no-brainer - plenty of films may be outside your comfort zone, and I would have
liked better supplements on some of the titles, but I can't help but be extremely
pleased with the fine presentation of these little film gems. From a comic
masterpiece to a maudlin melodrama, we still get in these seven films a great
insight into the charisma of one of celluloid's most potent icons, and can witness
through film-to-film something quite sublime coming through the screen.